


Widow's Death

by WhiskyInMind (MomentsLost)



Series: Choices (stop giving me choices) [1]
Category: Marvel Avengers Movies Universe, The Avengers (2012)
Genre: BlackHawk if you squint - Freeform, Gen, Pre-Movie, not actually character death - honest
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-14
Updated: 2012-08-14
Packaged: 2017-11-12 03:20:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 521
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/486090
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MomentsLost/pseuds/WhiskyInMind
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"He made a different call"</p><p>The mission to eliminate the Black Widow was never going to be straight-forward, unless the time was right for her to stop...</p>
            </blockquote>





	Widow's Death

**Author's Note:**

> This is my own take of just how Hawkeye convinced Nat to defect. Loosely connected to the Red Room mythology (I say 'loosely' because I've only recently starting exploring the comics-verse).

She tells herself her hands aren’t shaking. That would be a sign of weakness, and if there is one thing she is not – _has never been, even before..._ – is weak.

Her target is in her sights. All that she has to do is pull the trigger and the job is over. Complete. Done. Finished.

She can cast off this persona - this... Natasha - and get back to being...

What?

‘The Black Widow?’

 _She_ is flagged on every database and network on every conceivable side of any law written past, present and future.

‘Natasha?’

 _She_ only exists in the moment. For the length of the mission. Only alive for as long as needed. Then discarded.

Abandoned.

Deleted.

...only, there’s something about Natasha that makes her think this is real. Or that it could be. Something that makes her not want to see Natasha fade away into the next-

...there’s pain at whatever the thought was trying to be, but she fakes a sneeze and bluffs her way through it.

\- the next wipe. This time the pain that hits her is like nothing she’s ever experienced before.

She screams.

Can’t help it. Can’t stop it.

Doesn’t want to.

If ‘Natasha Romanova’ is going to die tonight, then she is going to die fighting.

The target moves, but she is ready for that. Still has the kill-shot. Until.... the boy moves into her sights.

He can’t be more than nine years old _(old enough)_ and has tears streaking his face. She knows that the kill-shot is still viable. She can still take out the target. But... she will also take out the boy.

Her hand shakes and this time she doesn’t deny it to herself.

She screams her anguish to whoever might be there to hear.

* * *

She knows that there is someone there. She felt the approach long before she heard the footsteps – stealthy though they were.

She closes her eyes.

Knows this is it.

This is the end

She wishes that she had had the chance to know Natasha but acknowledges that is just one more regret; one more thing she will never have the chance to do.

She takes a breath.

It hurts.

And it is the pain that tells her she isn’t dead.

Pain.

It, above all else, is real.

It means she is still alive.

But...

She frowns.

Opens her eyes.

Sees the point of the arrow aimed at a nebulous point between her eyes.

She knows the archer.

_(She knows him. She knows that if her hands don’t shake, then neither do his. Except for that one time when maybe they faltered, or maybe she was better than that.)_

He looks at her down the shaft of the arrow and she knows this she is dead. She no longer knows who she is, but whoever that may be – or may have become – this is the end.

Whoever she is.

Whoever she could become.

She looks up and meets his stare.

The point of the arrow drops, but she is not fooled. He has killed her. The ‘Black Widow’ is dead.

But... maybe... 

Natasha Romanoff might have a chance to live.


End file.
